Encouraging creativity in an organisation that is not stereotypically seen that way can be difficult, but there are some easy things you can do to foster creativity.
Creativity is an incredibly valuable resource for businesses, but it is often overlooked in so many industries. To get ahead of your competitors, it is worth thinking about how you can foster creativity among your employees, and one way of doing that is to reimagine your workspace.
You don’t have to be a graphic design company to benefit from introducing more creative thinking. Mark Rhodes, Reed’s director of marketing, told the Guardian: “The most successful businesses are those that engender creative thinking and develop environments where everyone generates ideas, has a voice, asks questions and challenges the norm.”
Start with the Workspace
In today’s dynamic work landscape, creativity stands as a pivotal asset across various industries. To outshine competitors, it’s essential to explore avenues for fostering creativity among your team members, and reimagining your workspace is one effective approach.
It’s crucial to tailor your space to how your team members work best and if you can offer employees diverse work environments, even better. If the work from home movement has taught us anything, its that people don’t want to be tied to their desks. Prolonged desk-bound hours can induce feelings of stagnation and discomfort. It’s crucial to tailor your space to how your team members work best, so get into the habit of asking how do they like to work.
Providing alternatives such as soft furnished breakout areas, standing desks, or even a designated relaxation space can invigorate creativity by offering employees choice.
Empower your team members
A happier workforce tends to be more creatively inclined. However, table tennis and scattering a few bean bags doesn’t equate to instant creativity. You need to show that you are committed to allowing your employees to be creatively free by giving them more control over their day.
Your team members can be empowered by giving them autonomy over their work and the freedom to explore their ideas. Avoid micromanagement and instead focus on setting clear goals and expectations. You can also introduce work policies that encourage your team to get out of the office and seek creative experiences.
This is the painful bit for most businesses: you then need to trust your team to deliver results in their own way. Offer flexible work arrangements, such as remote work options or flexible hours, to accommodate different working styles and personal needs, which can boost morale and creativity.
Collaboration for Creativity
Collaboration breeds creativity. Encourage your team by providing opportunities for your them to collaborate on projects, share ideas, and brainstorm solutions together. Cross-departmental collaborations is a brilliant way to leverage diverse perspectives and skill sets.
A creative workshop that looks to solve the organisation’s challenges is a really easy way to kick-start this. These workshops are a safe place for everyone to express their ideas, inspirations and even concerns without fear of judgement. It’s really important that a creative workshop is kept informal and the workplace hierarchy is flattened. This generates an atmosphere where everyone feels valued and respected, regardless of their role within the team.
Often brainstorms have the right people in the room, but without an impartial naive expert, a clear structure and pre loaded stimulus to feed into the thinking, people come to it cold and uninspired! Engaging a team beforehand and ensuring the objectives and actions afterwards are clear is key to creating a successful creative session. Creative workshops are more than post its on a wall! They should be exciting, encouraging people to express themselves and more importantly empowering for people to action afterwards – it shouldn’t be another to do list, it should let’s get on with this together.
We can provide your business and team with a one off or a series of workshops that aim to unlock the creativity to solve challenges you haven’t solved yet through traditional methods.
If you are interested in running your own creative workshops but need a guiding hand and inspiration to help facilitate the first one, get in touch!
